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Naive Candy (Candice Rialson) comes to Hollywood to make it big as a
moviestar, however, the agent she signs up with, Walter Paisley (Dick
Miller) proves to be low key, low key enough that he advices her to go
look for a job herself ... and soon enough, she ends up as the getaway
driver in a bankrobbery - and she only narrowly escapes the police.
However, this gives Walter an idea - to have her hired as a stunt driver
on Erich von Leppe's (Paul Bartel) latest film, where she also meets
writer Patrick (Jeffrey Kramer), whom she soon falls in love with, and
self-centered B-movie star Mary McQueen (Mary Woronov), who sees all other
girls on the set as direct competition, even if they are not actresses.
Candy's stuntdriving goes better than expected, ans doon she is hired
to shoot a girls-with guns film in the Philippines, this time as an
actress, with pretty much the same crew. The Filipino film however turns
out to be a ttraumatic experience, as on one hand one of her colleagues,
Jill (Tara Strohmeier) dies for real under mysteriuos circumstances during
a big shootout scene, and on the other hand in a rape scene, Candy is
almost raped for real. And as if that wasn't enough, at the US-premiere of
the film (on a triple bill in a drive-in) Candy is almost raped again ...
Next it's off to a science fiction movie with lots of crazy cars and
stunts (actually the cars were borrowed from Death
Race 2000, another New World film of the time - ironically
directed by Paul Bartel -, plus a lot of the carstunt footage was lifted
from that movie as well) but shot pretty much by teh same crew, only this
time several attempts on the lives of teh starlets are made, Mary's car is
blown up when she is only a few feet away, Candy suddenly realizes that
the brakes on her car are severed, and then Candy's colleague Bobbi (Rita
George) is found with a slashed throat. Now Candy wants out, but Patrick,
her scriptwriter boyfriend tries his best to make her stay - so much so
that she concludes he himself must be the killer, especially after she
finds newspaper clippings of the murders in his study. She makes a quick
getaway, and when Patrick comes after her to explain, his tyre blows ...
Walter in the meantime gets worried about Candy, one of his best
clients, and calls Mary if she's seen her - but instead he tells Mary
where he thinks she might be - only moments before Mary is revealed
to be the killer. But by that time, Mary has already caught up with Candy
beneath the Hollywood sign and desperately tries to kill her in any which
way possible ... but enter Patrick as the knight in shining armour, who
turns the tide, and ultimately Mary is squashed by the Y of the
Hollywood sign, the very letter she manipulated herself.
Patrick later has made the whole story into a script with Candy as
herself playing the role of her life.
And Walter Paisley, you might ask (or might not, actually) - He is
desperately trying to sign Robby the Robot for a role in the remake of Gone
with the Wind ...
Though considered by many (who might not even have seen the film) to be
a cult classic, Hollywood Boulevard as such is only so-so. Sure,
some of the injokes are a treat for trashfilm afficionados, and the fact
that New World, one of the key studios for grindhouse fare in the
1970's, actually produced this one can at least be called bold. The
downside of the film though is that the film at times gets too centered on
references while the paperthin plot gets more and more banal until it
culminates in a kitsch ending. Add to this the fact that both leads
Candice Rialson and Jeffrey Kramer lack the charisma to carry the movie
get a rough idea about the movie's qualities (or lack thereof). However,
in the acting department at least Dick Miller (who has all the funniest
lines), Paul Bartel and Mary Woronov) make the best of their scenes.
Not enough to save the movie as a whole maybe, but they save it from
being a desaster, or a mere fanboy film.
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